


fill my lungs with sweetness

by trashkingvibes



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Hanahaki Disease, M/M, Magical Realism, Miscommunication, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Pining, Witch!Braden Holtby, Witches Exist
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-27
Updated: 2020-10-27
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:35:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,456
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27221320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trashkingvibes/pseuds/trashkingvibes
Summary: Hanahaki, it was called. A disease caused by unrequited love. Flowers were growing in his lungs, as beautiful as they were terrible. He’d spend the next few months - the last few months of his young life - coughing up flower petal after flower petal, until it killed him.Until the love he had for Brock killed him. Until the beauty of this love filled his lungs and suffocated him. Until every traitorous flutter of his heart when Brock smiled at him bloomed in his chest.
Relationships: Brock Boeser/Elias Pettersson
Comments: 10
Kudos: 87
Collections: Canucks Fic Fest 2020





	fill my lungs with sweetness

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by [emperorpenguin (dortmundbvbbabe)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dortmundbvbbabe/pseuds/emperorpenguin) in the [CanucksFicFest2020](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/CanucksFicFest2020) collection. 



> Hello!
> 
> My first Canucks fic, hopefully I'll do okay!
> 
> Notes: Holtby is a Canuck (Marky was still traded) but Tanev and Stecher weren't. Actually, no other trades than that happened. (Sorry, Marky, I miss you). 
> 
> This is a work of fiction. Title from Bloom by The Paper Kites.

Elias coughed up the first flower on a Wednesday in early August.

It started out as a tickle in the back of his throat, a slight irritation. At first he wasn’t worried about it, he’d always gotten allergies in the fall - that ran in the family. He’d take some allergy meds and he’d be fine. 

But then he’d taken them, and the tickle hadn’t gone away the promised hour later.

The tickle had turned into a cough, racking through his body until he was bent over at the kitchen sink. He’d never felt anything like it before - he’d had bronchitis, he’d had colds, but this didn’t feel anything like that. He didn’t - he didn’t feel any other symptoms that came from the common flu. It had to be allergies - it _had_ to be.

But with each cough he realised it wasn’t. There was something lodged in his throat, choking him. He coughed and coughed - each cough more painful than the last - until he felt something in his mouth, something forcing its way over his tongue. He gagged, clawing at his throat, before he forced his fingers into his mouth. It was either that or asphyxiation.

Whatever was in his throat was slimy between his fingers; he pulled it all the way over his tongue and out from between his teeth, until he had a handful of bloody - something. He closed his fist, not wanting to look at it yet, too busy gulping in air like he’d been triple shifted and immediately bagskated. He took a moment to catch his breath and forced himself to open his palm.

When he got a closer look, it was obvious what it was, even if it had been squished. He was standing over his sink with a palmful of bloody flower petals. More than that: an entire flower, stem and all. 

_Daffodil_ , Elias noted with his limited flower knowledge, because there was yellow beneath the crimson of his blood. There was probably a meaning behind it - every flower he would cough up would have a meaning, he knew. 

Because he knew what this was, even if it wasn’t - this disease didn’t exist, it couldn’t. It was folklore, stories you tell your kids before bed. 

But Elias wasn’t one to just ignore the obvious, bury his head in the sand because he was wrong. There was proof in his hand, in the blood coating his mouth and chin. 

He felt his knees give out, hitting the floor. He - he was only twenty two. He was just getting started, was barely not a rookie. He had friends, family, teammates...he couldn’t die. Not like this, not right now.

Hanahaki, it was called. A disease caused by unrequited love. Flowers were growing in his lungs, as beautiful as they were terrible. He’d spend the next few months - the last few months of his young life - coughing up flower petal after flower petal, until it killed him. 

Until the love he had for Brock killed him. Until the beauty of this love filled his lungs and suffocated him. Until every traitorous flutter of his heart when Brock smiled at him bloomed in his chest.

Because it was Brock, of course it was. Who else? Even without the flowers ripping a hole in his throat, he knew that it couldn’t be anyone else.

Maybe the petals should have been sunflowers. 

The only cure was for his love to be returned, or for him to fall out of love. The latter wasn’t even close to being an option, and the former - that wasn’t an option either. Not with what happened at the end of the season, not with the look of horror Brock had sent him when Elias tried to tell him how he felt.

He leaned back against the kitchen cupboards, wiping at the blood on his mouth. He still held the flower in his hand, couldn’t make himself throw it away. He was almost using it as a tether, as proof of what happened. He stared at it, the yellow and crimson stark against his pale skin and felt tears prick his eyes.

It wasn’t fair. Brock was _everything_ , and that was meant to kill him? A love that Elias had never been ashamed of, had never felt he needed to let go, because even if Brock didn’t return his feelings, the way he felt wasn’t something to be _ashamed_ of.

And it was killing him, ripping him to pieces from the inside out.

He had to - he had to call Emil. He told him everything, no matter what. He knew about his feelings for Brock, his drunken confession gone wrong, everything in between, before, and after. He pulled out his phone with shaking fingers, trying not to get blood on the screen.

It didn’t take long for him to answer; it was dinner time in Sweden, but he was attached to his phone, especially when it came to Elias. "Hello?”

“Emil,” was all he could say, the rest of the words getting caught in his throat.

“Elias?” 

“I-” Elias’s voice broke, and suddenly it was too much. The sob that ripped its way out of his throat was a ghost of the daffodil that preceded it.

“Elias? Elias, are you okay?” Emil sounded understandably frantic.

“I’m - I’m dying, Emil.” There was no use sugar coating it.

There was a sharp inhale and then silence. 

“What do you mean?” Emil whispered.

Elias squeezed his eyes closed. “Flowers. I’m coughing up flowers.”

“What?”

“You heard what I said,” Elias snapped, opening his eyes.

“Are you sure?”

“Am I sure what, that I’m coughing up flowers? Because the flower in my hand proves that.” He was angry now, at Emil for not believing him, at himself for loving someone that would never love him back. At Brock, for being so damn beautiful.

“Are you sure that you’re-” Emil choked on a breath. “Dying.”

“You know how this works.”

Elias could picture what his face looked like. Brows knitted together, half in confusion, half in grief. “That’s not real though, that’s just an old wives tale.”

“I can assure you it’s not.”

“How do you know that’s what it is?” Emil was grasping at straws now, understandably so. It sounded ridiculous - his brother dying because flowers were choking him simply due to unrequited love.

Elias sighed. “Do you know another reason why I’d be coughing up flowers? I suppose I can’t know for sure but - even if it isn’t hanahaki I’m probably still dying.”

Stuff blocking your lungs was hardly a good sign no matter the cause.

“There has to be - we can figure this out,” Emil said frantically.

“I don’t think there’s figuring this out,” Elias choked. “There’s only two ways for this to get better, and I can’t think of any way either of those things would happen.”

“It’s Brock.” It wasn’t a question.

Elias nodded before he realised Emil couldn’t see him. “Yeah.”

“Are you sure he -”

“Emil,” Elias cut off. He sounded sharp, but false hope was the last thing they needed right now.

He knew his brother, and could tell by his hitched breath that he was holding back tears. “I’m coming to Vancouver.”

“What?” That wasn’t the plan - it wouldn’t kill him tomorrow, his brother didn’t need to be here for the beginning, for when it was easy. “No, you can’t. You have preseason and Fanny and -”

“My brother is _dying,_ and you think I fucking care about hockey right now?” Emil interrupted. “Do you really think any of our family fucking cares about _hockey?_ ” 

_‘I do,’_ Elias didn’t say. Emil knew that.

“This could take _months,”_ Elias insisted. 

“I’ll call you with my flight details.”

He hung up before Elias could try and talk him out of it. 

If he was being honest with himself, which he tried to be, the idea of his family being here comforted him. He stood up, tossing the daffodil into the sink to deal with later, and unlocked his phone.

Who the fuck was he meant to call? Tanny? Bo? _Brock?_

He needed...he needed someone that he didn’t have an emotional connection to. Bo would probably cry and insist he tell Brock, and the idea of Brock knowing he was killing his best friend - the guilt would destroy him. Brock couldn’t know, at least not yet.

There was only one person he could call, and it was mostly obvious. 

It was new, Braden on the team. They’d only practiced together for a few weeks but he’d fit in seamlessly, even after the heartbreak that was losing Marky. He was a good guy, someone Elias was starting to trust but didn’t have such an emotional connection to that would make it hard to talk about his feelings. 

Elias wasn’t known for talking about his feelings at the best of times, let alone doing it while Bo Horvat stared sadly at him.

It also helped that the Holtby’s went to pride every year and vocally supported LGBTQ+ rights. At least the queer part wouldn’t make the conversation doubly hard. He pulled out his phone again, opening Braden’s contact.

It rang enough times that Elias thought he wouldn’t answer, but just as Elias was pulling back to end the call, he did. “Hello?” 

“Hey.” Elias cleared his throat. “It’s Petey.”

“I could tell,” Braden sounded amused. There was chatter in the background, the kind of noise that came with having multiple children in the room.

“Are you -” Elias cleared his throat again. “Do you think I could -”

“Pete, are you okay?” There was the sound of a door opening and closing and then silence on the other end. He must have gone into a separate room, realising that Elias was upset.

“Not - really?” It was vulnerable; he wasn’t used to admitting he wasn’t okay, especially to his teammates and _especially_ to teammates he didn’t know very well yet.

“Do you want to go for lunch?” Braden asked gently.

Lunch hadn’t been his goal, if he even had a goal in mind at all, but lunch sounded nice, and eating would give him something to distract himself. 

Elias nodded, not even caring that Braden couldn’t see him. “Yeah. Yes. Please.”

“I’ll pick you up, text me your address.”

“Thanks, Holts.”

“Any time.”

They both hung up and Elias struggled to his feet. He was an adult, he could have this conversation, even if it was a weird conversation to have.

The text came immediately after Elias had sent his address:

_Be there in 45_

Enough time to wipe the blood off his face and figure out what to do about the flower in his sink.

Maybe it was the romantic in him - though no one would ever accuse him of being a romantic, not even himself - but he rinsed off the flower as gently as he could and wrapped it in a paper towel. He’d dry it properly later.

Not many people coughed up a physical manifestation of their unrequited love, and while it may be a little macabre, it was something to hold on to - at least for the next few months.

He wandered slowly to his bathroom, not wanting to see the blood on his face. That seemed to be even more proof than the flower on his kitchen counter.

Proof that it came from him, that it came from his lungs.

When he forced himself to look up, he thought he looked more gaunt than usual, but that may be him projecting. He knew logically he didn’t look like more of a skeleton just because he was dying, but he did feel like one.

It was a strange feeling, knowing he was dying. Having an awareness of his own mortality. He hadn't really had time to process it yet, but that would come. Right now he just felt empty; he wasn't even crying anymore. He was numb.

He didn't realise how long he'd been standing in front of the mirror until his phone vibrated in his pocket.

"Can you buzz me up?” Why Braden needed to be buzzed up was a mystery, but there was no harm with letting him in.

"Uh, yeah, sure,” Elias said, furrowing his brow.

"Thanks, man."

Braden hung up and Elias went to let him in. When he came into the apartment it was obvious why he wanted to be buzzed up as he was laden with bags of takeaway; he did his best to shrug through the weight of the bags. 

"Whatever it is, thought you may prefer not to have this conversation in public,” the goalie explained.

Elias huffed half a laugh. “You're probably right.”

Elias got plates and utensils, sitting them both at the small table in his kitchen. For the next few minutes, the only sound was the clink of forks against ceramic. 

“So, what's up?” Braden asked, breaking the silence that was slowly becoming stifling.

“Um. I'm gay,” Elias blurted out, which wasn’t what he meant to say at all; like he was expecting, it was the first time in his life telling someone he was gay was the easier option, though.

Braden set down his fork and met his eyes.“Thank you for trusting me with this, Elias.”

Elias shook his head. “That's not - not what I want to tell you. I mean, I _am_ gay, and I wanted to tell you, but is not why I called. I mean, it kind of is. But not - completely?”

“Oh?”

Elias stood up slowly and walked to the sink. Reaching to pick up the flower, he swallowed audibly.

“This is why I called.” He turned to walk just as slowly back to the table, taking the time to sit down before he unfolded the paper towel on the table in front of Braden.

Braden’s brow furrowed. “A flower?”

“I coughed it up.”

Braden's breath hitched. “When?”

“An hour ago.”

“What do you think this means?” Braden said after a beat of silence.

Elias shrugged, aiming for nonchalance but missing by a mile. “I think I am dying from a disease that I didn't think actually existed until two hours ago when I coughed up entire flower.” He cleared his throat and looked down at the tabletop. He couldn’t look Braden in the eye, couldn’t admit his weakness directly. “Because I - because I love a man that does not love me back.”

“Hanahaki.” Eight letters. Four syllables. Such a simple word, said so, so simply; a death sentence.

Elias nodded. Braden reached for the flower, closing his eyes when he touched it; he exhaled as if he was in pain. “Rare, but not unheard of.”

“So you agree? Is hanahaki?”

“In my professional opinion, yeah,” Braden sighed, touching the center of the daffodil.

“Professional opinion?” Elias was almost positive that hockey players didn’t have professional opinions on fake diseases.

“My opinion as an earth witch,” Braden elaborated, opening his eyes.

And that - that was. That was new. “An earth...witch.”

Braden nodded firmly. “An earth witch.”

“You...are witch.” 

“I’m a witch.”

“Like. With magic.”

“With magic.” 

“Witch magic?” Elias questioned, trying to make sense of it all. It shouldn’t be such a surprise, that magic existed; he was coughing up flowers because he was in love with his best friend. That should prove the existence of some sort of magic in itself, but the idea of Braden Holtby - Stanley Cup winner, veteran goaltender, his _teammate_ \- being a witch was absolutely incomprehensible.

“Witch magic,” Braden confirmed.

“So you do...magic.”

“That kind of goes with the ‘witch’ thing, yes.” Braden sounded like he was explaining it to a child which, fair. 

“I’m sorry, I just learned that hanahaki is real and now witches and magic exists. I'm a little -” He waved his hand, not having the English words to describe it.

“We try not to be loud about it.” Braden raised an eyebrow. “There was that whole ‘burn them alive’ thing which didn’t work out too well.”

Elias winced. That would do it.

“But there are a lot of goalies that are witches, actually,” Braden continued. “More in the Euro leagues than the NHL, but even some in the NHL.”

“Really?”

“Goalies are weird,” Braden shrugged. “Is it hard to believe that a lot of them are witches?”

“Anyone being a witch is hard to believe,” Elias said, raising a brow of his own.

“Fair,” Braden conceded. “But focus is important in witchcraft. Goalies need focus.”

Elias pondered that for a moment, before nodding. “Makes sense.”

“So you believe me, then?”

“I don’t know why you would lie,” Elias shrugged. “I might not understand it but you wouldn’t lie to me about this.”

“I wouldn’t.”

“Do witches...do you use magic on the ice?” 

Braden shook his head. “There’s a code of sorts, among the witches in the league.”

“How many witches _are_ there?” He could say without a doubt that today had been the most unbelievable day of his life. And considering he didn’t have much time left, would probably stay that way.

“More than you know.”

“Not just goalies?” Elias asked.

“Not just goalies,” Braden answered. “You probably knew some in Sweden and didn’t know it.”

“Are there any on the team?”

He got a shrug in return. “I don’t want to out any witches, because you know. Burned at the stake and all that, but you have a magical disease, I’m sure the Sedins don’t care that you know they’re witches. They’re air witches, though. There are also a few on the team with magic that never learned about it. They don’t know they have it.”

“That sucks.”

“It does, yeah. I couldn’t imagine not having my magic.”

“Are you going to tell them?”

“Not yet,” Braden shrugged. “Maybe once I’ve been on the team for a while longer.”

Elias took a bite of his food. “So, no magic on the ice.”

“No magic on the ice,” the other man nodded.

“What happens if someone uses magic on the ice?”

“Depends on what they use it for,” Braden explained. “Some elements can’t be used on the ice without it being obvious, like fire and earth, but air and water witches have been known to use their powers to help their teams. If they’re caught and it’s really bad, they can get their magic stripped, which has never actually happened in the NHL. Some get kicked out of the league altogether, which is another reason there are so many witches in the Euro leagues. But most of the time it’s a mysterious upper body injury that keeps them out for a month, or a fine.”

Elias pondered that while he took another bite; he thought of all the players that had left the NHL suddenly yet had kept playing in Europe. Was Kovalchuk a witch? Surely Braden would know?

He shook his head. That wasn’t important, though, not right now. He had too many questions about magic to focus on Ilya fucking Kovalchuk.

“So, if you are an earth witch, and the Sedins are air, what does that mean?”

_Fucking idiot, of course it means the Sedins use air magic and Holts uses earth magic._

“Every witch has an elemental speciality. Air, fire, earth, or water.” Braden was nice enough to not call him an idiot to his face. Maybe it was the part where Elias was dying, but for whatever reason, he was grateful. “Witch specialities are based around zodiac. ”

Elias paused, trying to parse that one, before he shook his head. “I know nothing about zodiac.”

“Neither do I,” Braden confessed. “To me it’s really just a fancy way of saying it depends on when you were born. My gran could tell you more.” He waved his fork around. “My birthday is September 16th, so I’m a Virgo, which is an earth symbol, so I’m an earth witch.”

“What do you do with your -” Elias waved his fingers. 

“My -” he mimicked Elias’s finger wave with a grin. His grin was small; the underlying theme of ‘my teammate is dying’ probably put a dampener on the whole lunch.

“Do you just - control dirt and plants?”

“Yeah, sure. But it’s more than controlling dirt and plants.”

“What do you mean?”

He tilted his head and Elias felt a rumbling beneath his feet, followed by a sudden sort of - calmness. Like his heartbeat had settled for the first time in hours. Like he was on even footing for the first time in hours, days even.

“Most of my magic is around herbs and plants, yeah,” Braden continued, playing with the daffodil Elias had put in front of him. “But it’s all about nurturing.”

“Nur...ture?” The word sounded familiar, but it wasn’t one he used every day, so he wasn’t positive that he was even pronouncing it right.

“Nurture,” Braden corrected. “It means to grow and develop.”

“Ah,” Elias nodded. He recognised it now. 

“So I can control dirt and plants, like you said,” Braden continued, “But also use my magic to ground people, can use it to help people realise how much they’re appreciated and loved. Nurture them. Things people wouldn’t really think about. Less obvious things.” He touched a finger to the wilting flower. “You chose a good witch to talk to about hanahaki, at the very least.”

“Can you prove that is what it is?”

“This flower doesn’t feel like a normal flower, I know that much.” He reached out his hand and made to lay it on Elias’s chest. “Can I?”

When Elias nodded, he rested his hand in the center of Elias’s chest, bringing the other to his own chest. He closed his eyes for a moment and breathed deeply; his breath stuttered for a beat, and then he pulled his hand back like he'd been burnt.

There was no need for him to say anything; his reaction confirmed it. Elias squeezed his eyes closed but the yellow of the daffodil was seared into the back of his eyelids. 

“I’m sorry, Pete.” And he _sounded_ sorry, like this was something he should be able to fix.

“Not your fault.”

“You must really love this man,” Braden said, reaching to cradle the wilting flower in both hands. “Not many people cough up whole flowers, especially not for your first.”

“Yeah - I uh. I do.”

Because he did. More than anything. More than - fuck, he loved Brock more than he loved the way his skates cut through the ice. 

His love for Brock was all encompassing; every part of his heart that didn’t belong to his family belonged to Brock in some way. Even his hockey was tied up in Brock - there was no part of him that his best friend didn’t influence.

The romantic love was just a drop in the fucking ocean.

“Do I know him?” It wasn’t pressing, and was obvious Braden didn’t expect an answer, but Elias had only told a handful of people - even if it was obvious that other people close to him knew, because, according to Quinn, he was never subtle when it came to Brock.

“Uh. It’s - it’s Brock.” Saying it outloud to someone else felt like relief - if he only had a few months left, what was stopping him, though? He could shout it from the rooftops, tell every reporter he came across, post it on twitter every day for the rest of his life.

Braden nodded, accepting it easily. "He's a good kid."

"Yeah. Yeah he is."

“And are you sure he doesn’t feel the same way?” It wasn’t accusatory, but calculating with the underlying grief that this entire conversation had been based on.

Elias scoffed. “If he did I wouldn’t be dying, would I?”

“Not necessarily,” Braden corrected. “Even if the love _is_ requited, until it’s been communicated, the disease won’t go away. Both have to know.”

“I uh - tried to tell him. Once. It did not work out.”

Braden nodded with a sigh. “I wish it was different.”

“Not your fault,” Elias repeated again.

“Daffodil,” Braden said, nodding towards the flower in his hands. “Do you know what a daffodil means?”

Elias shook his head. He hadn't had a chance to look it up yet.

Braden hummed. “New beginnings. Happiness.”

_Sounds like Brock._

“Do you know what all flowers mean?”

“Another thing that comes with being an earth witch, I’m afraid.”

Elias hummed.

“Like I said. You chose a good witch to come to about hanahaki.” He ran a finger along the stem and Elias watched in half awe as the dead flower seemed to blossom, like it was fresh from the soil. He rubbed a hand absentmindedly over his chest.

“Can you cure it?”

“I can’t completely cure it,” Braden answered with a shake of his head. “But there are ways to control it.” 

“What ways?” Anything, he’d do anything.

“The closest thing to a cure is a surgery that can remove the flowers completely.”

“Really?” That sounded too good to be true.

“I - Elias, it might make the flowers go away, but the other effects -” He sounded horrified, like he couldn’t even continue his sentence.

“What are they?” Elias prompted.

“You will lose all love you’ve ever felt for Brock. Ever. Any kind of love. Romantic, platonic, familial. All love gone forever, with no chance of getting it back. Some even lose memories they had with their person.”

It was no wonder Braden was horrified at the thought of it. Not loving Brock, losing some of his best memories just because they were tied to that love - it was unfathomable. 

He’d said ‘anything’, but he couldn’t do that. He could _never_ do that.

“Is this the only way?” There had to be other ways, any other way.

“There are ways to make it take longer and make it less severe. Medicine so it doesn’t kill you in three months. They will help you play and can give you as long as a year.”

“A year?” A year was more than he’d ever hoped for. He’d have to tell Emil to cancel his flight if it was going to be a _year._

“Longer sometimes.” _Longer than a year?_ _“_ I have a friend. He’d been sick for almost a year and only coughed up one kind of flower. Most people cough up at least three types. He used the time he had to fall out of love.”

Elias gave a dismissive wave of his hand. “Not going to happen.”

“Are you _sure_ Brock doesn’t love you?” 

“If he did, I wouldn’t be dying.”

“True love’s kiss is the best way to cure any magical diseases and curses.”

“I’m not his true love,” Elias answered. The sooner he got that into his skull the better. “What medicine?”

“Herbs, other flowers. The easiest way to take them is through an inhaler,” Braden explained, making a motion towards his mouth. “All teams have at least one witch on their staff, I’ll send a recipe to whichever person that is.”

“Thank you.”

“I can give you a boost like I did earlier when I see you, but not every day, or it will drain me.”

“Thank you,” Elias repeated.

“Think about telling him,” Braden said, nudging their feet together.

“Not going to happen,” Elias said again. He was repeating himself more than he liked, but Braden didn't seem to believe him. 

“But no to surgery?”

Elias wrapped his arms around his waist. “I can’t imagine a world without him. Without how I feel about him.”

“You’d die for him?”

Without a doubt. The idea of fated love, a love he’d die for, a love that meant more to him than his own life, had always made him roll his eyes as a child. Who could he love enough to die for? Who could he possibly love enough to step in front of a bullet for? Brock was always defying expectations, it’s no surprise this was different. “He’s - everything I’ve ever wanted. Friend, partner.”

“How are you sure he’d never love you back?” 

“I told you,” Elias responded through gritted teeth; he wanted to shake him, tell him to just let it fucking go. “I told him.”

“Can I hug you?” Braden asked quietly, standing up.

“Please.” His voice broke, but he stood as well.

Braden’s hug was warm, and definitely the kind of hug you’d expect from a devoted husband and father. It took a second for Elias to hear the soft soothing noises coming from the other man, and another second to realise he was shaking, unable to hold in the tears that stained the shoulder of Braden’s t-shirt. 

“I can’t - how do I do this? How do I die?” Elias hiccuped through a sob. Braden rubbed his back, continuing to make soothing noises. Whether he was using his powers or not Elias wasn’t sure, but even magic couldn’t help him now, not with how all encompassing his grief was. “How do I accept that the one thing I want more than anything in the world is the thing that’s going to kill me? That the one person I’d live for is who I’ll die for?”

He’d slipped into Swedish, he noticed, unable to grasp enough English to put his agony into words.

“I’m not going to say it’s going to be okay,” Braden said softly. “But I’m here for you, here _with_ you. You’re not alone in this.”

Elias drew a shuddering breath and pulled back, wiping roughly at his face. “Thank you.”

“I’ll get in contact with the team witch. I can’t make it okay,” Braden repeated. “But I can make it easier.”

“Thank you,” Elias repeated for what felt like the upteenth time. Braden sent him a soft smile and pressed a kiss to his forehead.

-

Elias was good at compartmentalizing; he had to be. He was known for his understanding of the game. He had to be able to tuck his thoughts away on the ice. 

On the ice, he was Elias Pettersson - he was the Alien, he was the complete player, he was fancy feet and a quick release. Awards won, records broken. He was a face of the franchise, part of one of the deadliest lines in the Western conference.

That Elias was Vancouver’s; with his visor over his eyes, stick in one hand and heart in the other, he was Vancouver’s, and it was exhilarating. That Elias was Vancouver’s, but Vancouver was his, too. 

In the room, he was Petey. He was face washes and relentless chirps about his frankly _impeccable_ fashion sense, about his resting bitch face and his social media presence. 

But he was also soft grins sent from Brock, proud nods from Jordie, fist bumps from Bo. That Elias was a Canuck. He was the Canucks’ in the room, and they were his. Each and every one of them, irrevocably his, and he hated that he wouldn’t get the chance to properly explain how much that meant to him.

(Maybe he should start a bucket list.)

Elias Pettersson. Petey. Two facets of the same person, two different parts of him that fit together to form the man he was today.

Maybe that was getting to be a bit too introspective for three in the afternoon, though.

Anyway - the point was, he was good at compartmentalizing. His mind consisted of boxes. He had his short term goals in one box, his career long goals in another, his lifelong goals in a third. Winning the Cup, that went in the first box; ‘being the best in the world’ went in the second box, and being happy went in the third.

Those three boxes were the definite boxes. He _would_ win the Cup; he _would_ be the best in the world. He _would_ be happy.

But there was a fourth box, a box of fool’s hopes. They weren’t definites. Most of them weren’t even ‘maybe’s, or ‘if I work hard enough’s. 

His feelings for Brock were in that box.

Being into teammates was always something Elias refused to do; sure, in the past there had been guys that he’d found attractive on his teams, but it was easy to ignore that and focus on playing, on getting better.

He wasn’t ashamed of his sexuality, his feelings for Brock weren’t something to be _ashamed_ of, but they _were_ inconvenient. 

He hated the thought of Brock being disgusted by him, or making Brock uncomfortable because he found out about Elias’s ill advised ‘crush’. 

He’d just - sit on his feelings. Unrequited love was a bitch, but as long as Elias tucked it into that fourth box (the box firmly labeled ‘Do Not Open’) and double, triple locked it, his feelings were harmless.

Or, they had been harmless. Maybe the idea of unrequited love being harmless should be revisited.

Obviously it wasn’t harmless, or Elias wouldn’t be dying.

But the idea of surgery...of losing that love. That love that he felt so deeply he couldn’t lock it away, that was so inherent to him he couldn’t hide it to the point that it had spilled over at the end of last season when Elias had had one too many drinks - if he had to choose a catalyst for his disease he would choose that moment. His stupid mouth that couldn’t control his own fucking emotions.

_“We’ll do it next year.” Brock was strong in his conviction, his voice leaving no room for argument._

_“I know," Elias nodded._

_“I swear it," Brock insisted, wide eyes bright even in the dark light of the bar the team had chosen to drown their sorrows of not making the playoffs, again._

_“I believe you," Elias reassured him. He could say anything right now and Elias would believe it, as long as they stayed wrapped around each other like this. Tucked away in the corner of some bar, surrounded by teammates, completely intertwined to the point where his drunken brain wanted to say things like ‘he didn’t know where he ended and Brock began’._

_“Pete, I’m so drunk," Brock sighed dramatically, like he was admitting his deepest, darkest secret and not just admitting that he was shit faced._

_Elias pressed a laugh into Brock’s neck, because he'd never been so charmed by another man in his life. Brock's neck was warm and slightly sweaty, and he wanted nothing more than to press a kiss to the skin, suck a bruise into the space where his shoulder met his neck._

_“I think I am, too.” His accent was heavier, English harder to grasp._

_“Petey, Petey, you’re so good.”_

_“And you so drunk, Brock.”_

_Brock pulled back so he could look earnestly into Elias’s eyes. No one could do earnest like Brock Boeser. “No, I mean it. You’re going to be the best of all time and I’m so glad I get to play with you and your hockey makes me kinda horny -” which was definitely something to touch on when they were both sober - “everything about you is the best ever.”_

_“If I am the best ever and you are the best ever...who is driving the car?”_

_Elias would make terrible jokes every day of the week if it meant he got to hear Brock’s ridiculous laugh._

_“You really think I’m the best?” He’d stopped laughing, but he looked near tears, like nothing had ever meant more to him than Elias saying he was the best. His eyes were deadly._

_Elias smiled and gave into the urge to brush a lock of hair from Brock’s face, twirling it around his index finger. “Always.”_

_“Always? I thought you hated me when we first met.”_

_Elias smoothed out the furrow of Brock's brow with the same finger that had been in his head and shrugged. “You were loud, very American. My English, not so good. You confused me.”_

_“Do I confuse you still?”_

_Elias hummed and nodded, trailing his finger across Brock’s frankly ridiculous jawline. “Different way, though.”_

_Brock swallowed audibly; Elias thumbed his Adam's apple. “What way?”_

_He took a deep breath._ Come on, Pettersson, man up. _“I am confused because the way you feel for me - is different from how I feel for you.”_

_It wasn’t the ideal time or place to tell him, and his drunken state made his English worse than it'd been in months, but the relief Elias felt at finally telling Brock how he felt was palpable and all encompassing. There was a weight off his shoulders, and Brock -_

_Brock was pulling back, expressive eyes betraying exactly how he felt._

_Horror, disgust, pity. All flashing across Brock’s handsome face._

_“Petey...I’m so sorry -” And he_ sounded _sorry, like it was his fault Elias was in love with him, which he supposed it technically was, but who could blame him? Stronger people than Elias have tried and failed to fall for Brock; he was hardly special._

_“I have to go.” Elias stood up too quickly, feeling the effects of the alcohol, before stumbling his way out of the booth._

_“Elias!” Brock called after him when he was halfway across the room. “Let me explain, please.”_

_His voice broke on ‘please’, and it was almost enough to get Elias to stop fleeing. But then he remembered the horrified look on his face, and refused to turn around. He wasn't self sacrificing enough to stay and listen to Brock try and explain why they shouldn't be friends anymore._

_He made eye contact with Quinn at the bar, who nodded at whatever expression he saw on Elias's face and turned to presumably distract Brock from following Elias out the door._

The next day Brock was back in Minnesota without a word; Elias had planned on coming to visit him over the summer, but Brock had ghosted him as soon as they weren't in the same city anymore. Ignored all of his texts, admittedly few though they were, and when he’d asked Bo if Brock was ignoring _everyone_ , all he got were sad, pitying eyes.

Brock meant _so_ much to so many people, Elias included. The idea that he could lose him - lose his soft smiles, his loud ridiculous laughs that sounded more than a little fake, his rambling stories. Everything. Brock was everything. And the mere thought of losing that - all Elias could do was clench his hands into fists at his sides. He’d already gotten a taste of not knowing Brock, and it was destroying him.

It wasn’t the threat of losing romantic love - that he could easily go without - but to be without Brock altogether…

He couldn’t even fathom it, and didn’t pause to entertain the surgery. It may be stupid, but Elias never claimed to be smart.

There was a vase that he’d gotten as a gift that he’d never used, that was the perfect height for a daffodil. At least he’d have a chance to use that before -

Well. Before.


End file.
